Wyvern’s Gold (The Ruins Of Men Book 1)

Chapter 2

Two

Ayla

I wasn't sure what time we'd started, but the clock in the hall said it was nearly five in the morning when we finished. Exhausted and moving slowly, the women all headed towards the bathing area. There, we washed the blood of countless men from our hands and arms, scrubbed our bodies, and then trickled back towards our hall to find sleep again.

When I slipped into my room, I found Meri sitting on her bed in her nightclothes once more. There were tear streaks on her face and her hands were laced in her lap. From her closed eyes, I could only guess she was praying.

"He's going to be okay now," I promised as I made my way over.

Immediately, her lids lifted and a smile touched her lips. "I know. Oh, Ayla, I know, and I was thanking God for you. Only Mrs. Worthington is as skilled at saving lives, and she was already working on someone."

"Healing is the one thing I'm good at," I said, trying hard not to brag and failing as I claimed a spot on her bed beside her. "But you'll still be able to get married, right?"

She nodded, but paused as the door opened again. Callah slipped in with her wet hair tied up at the back of her neck. The dampness turned the color darker, nearly strawberry blonde. As her eyes fell on Meri, her brow furrowed for a moment before she hurried over to claim the other side.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Gideon," I explained.

"No..." Callah breathed, fearing the worst.

Meri just shook her head. "He's going to live. Ayla saved him , Callah! He said we'll still get married, but asked if we could wait until the seventh day." Then her lips split into a grin. "And he officially proposed!"

Callah and I both sucked in a breath, twisting to see her even better. "And it counts now, right?" Callah asked excitedly.

Meri was nodding her head vigorously. "It's officially my birthday, so yes."

Callah squealed in enthusiasm, doing her best to keep the volume as quiet as possible. "Oh, that's amazing. Meri, you don't know how lucky you are to have a young man. I mean, Gideon's even handsome!"

"Not as handsome as some," Meri pointed out, but her smile ruined the humble words.

"More handsome than my options," I reminded her.

"Or mine," Callah groaned, flopping onto her back. "I mean, I could choose Boaz Alred, but I'm not sure he can even propose anymore!"

"They'll remove him from your list before you turn twenty," I reminded her.

Because Boaz had slipped and fallen a few weeks back. When his head hit the stone, his thoughts had been banished from his mind. The man could barely walk even with assistance, and he couldn't move his limbs well enough to feed himself. No longer would he be capable of producing children, which was the entire purpose of marriage.

"All the rest of my choices are old," Callah went on. "And I heard Reynold Saunders is available again."

"He is," Meri admitted. "His last wife died recently while bringing his twelfth child into the world."

Those words made all three of us fall silent. The poor woman had been thirty-four years old. A respectable age for a woman, and older than most. Yet while no one spoke about what complications she'd suffered, I could guess. The baby had been breech, or too big, or she'd started bleeding. That was always what happened. It was how every woman seemed to die in the compound.

But thirty-four was only a bit more than fourteen years older than us. Few women managed to survive so long. The three of us now had less time left than we'd had of life. We were nineteen years old - well, except Meri, who'd just turned twenty as of a few hours ago. It didn't feel like enough.

"You're going to be okay, right?" I asked, looking over at Meri.

She smiled, but it was a little tense. "Haven't you seen my hips, Ayla? I'm going to be one of those women who has ten children and lives to be forty! Besides, Gideon swears he'll spoil me. I shouldn't be bred all the time, right?"

Callah laughed, but it was strained. "Even if you are, we'll spoil your babies, Meri. Who knows, maybe with Gideon being hurt, it'll be a bit before you consummate the marriage?"

"His wounds are significant," I pointed out. "Who knows, maybe you'll even have a month before he can breed you?"

"I wouldn't mind kissing him, though," Meri admitted. "He's just so handsome. I mean, he has these muscles in his arms that bulge and make me want to giggle. Plus, Mrs. Patterson told me some women enjoy being bred."

Callah and I both made faces. We girls had heard the rumors. We knew what happened in the marriage bed. For the last three years, we'd all had the same class to prepare us for our wedding nights. Men would insert themselves inside us, we would bleed, and that blood would be proof of our faith. Without it, we could be rejected as heathens and cast out of the compound.

"How long do you think someone could live aboveground?" I asked, the thought springing randomly into my mind.

"Ayla!" Callah hissed. "You saw the hunters tonight!"

"Well, yeah..."

"Yeah?" Meri chimed in, mocking me. "They spend a few days up there and always come back like that! If they - the men trained to fight - can't survive it, then what chance does anyone else have? Especially some feeble woman!"

"And we lost four hunters tonight," Callah told me. "Four young, strong men who were killed by the Dragons."

"But what if one could avoid the Dragons?" I asked.

The look Meri gave me was tired. "It's not possible, Ayla. You know that."

"Yeah," I mumbled, "but it's not like we're going to live long down here either."

"But we'll have children to remember us by," Meri pointed out. "Up there, it's just demons and the Devil's followers."

Callah leaned to push my arm playfully. "Unless you're planning to worship the Devil? I mean, that might buy you some time. At least until the wild men decide to use your body as their toy."

"Eww!" I huffed. "No thank you!" I almost stopped there, but couldn't. "It's just that I'm not ready."

"You have months still," Callah assured me.

"I know," I muttered, "but I'm still not ready. I don't like any of my choices. I mean, I'll get Reynold Saunders too! How am I supposed to be ready for a life where I'll be impaled repeatedly by some old man?"

"It's easier with a young and handsome choice," Meri admitted. "If Gideon had passed tonight?" She shook her head. "I don't think I could do it either."

"But what other option do we have?" Callah asked.

"None. It is our duty to be fruitful," Meri said, quoting part of our lectures.

"Always fruitful," Callah muttered even as she pulled herself off the bed and made her way over to her own. "And I'm glad Gideon lived, but my eyes feel like they have the Lord's hands pulling them lower."

"Same," I agreed, scooting towards the edge so I could head to my own bed. "I'm really glad Gideon's going to be okay, Meri. You deserve a happy marriage."

"It's because you saved him," Meri reminded me. "Ayla, when you started giving orders to Tobias?"

"I knew he'd be strong enough to hold him down," I explained.

"It's not that," Meri insisted. "It's how brave you were! I could never talk to a man like that."

"He'd probably hit me if I tried," Callah mumbled, clearly exhausted.

"They won't hit me in the infirmary," I explained. "It's the one place where we women are allowed to take charge."

"But most men don't care," Meri countered. "Spare the rod and spoil a wife, right?"

"Seen but not heard," Callah added.

"Beautiful to behold, a feast for the eyes of men," Meri quoted.

I groaned as I flopped down on my own bed. "I know, I know."

"I think it's those books you read," Callah teased.

"You can read them too," I reminded her.

She shook her head against the pillow. "I don't want to climb. Too much work. Besides, I'd be terrified someone would know."

"But they don't even know the room exists," I said.

Callah grunted dismissively. "Doesn't matter. I'd quote something I'd learned in one and the men would figure it out. I don't know how you keep it all to yourself."

"She doesn't," Meri said, still sitting cross-legged on her bed. "She tells us."

"And neither of you have gotten in trouble yet," I teased. "Which means you're good at keeping your mouths shut."

"Well, then maybe you should tell us another one of those stories." Meri flashed me a smile before pulling back her covers. "Something happy, Ayla. Something to make me forget seeing those blue feathers in my fiancé's chest."

Which was enough to make Callah sit up in a rush. "Blue?"

"The Wyvern," I said, proving we all knew what it meant. "He put four arrows into Gideon. One just missed his lungs. Three hit his gut. I had to push one out the back so I didn't destroy his liver."

"How do you even know where those are?" Callah insisted.

I chuckled softly. "The books. There are so many with pictures of the insides of people. It shows the lungs, the heart, and all the vital organs."

"Which is why you're so good in the infirmary," Meri said. "Do you think Mrs. Worthington has ever read them?"

"No," I said as I changed into my nightclothes. "I think Mrs. Worthington learned about the vital organs by seeing what wounds killed our hunters. She said she lost many patients before learning how to clamp the blood vessels. That's why she showed me how."

"Maybe they'll let you be a nurse instead of a wife," Callah said.

I murmured at that and then slipped under my blankets. "I'd be happy as a nurse. I wish I could learn as much as a doctor, though."

"Only men were doctors," Meri countered, "and we don't have enough medicine anymore to need them."

"It was different back when people lived on the surface," I told her. "My books say there were both men and women as doctors. Lots of types of doctors too. Back then, people did a lot of things we can't do now."

"Which is why the Devil won," Callah said. "Because women forgot our place is to serve our husbands."

"All men," Meri corrected.

"Mm..." I murmured. "I just wish I knew where the Dragons were back then."

That made Callah lift her head again. "What?"

"The Dragons," I clarified. "Back when people lived on the surface of the Earth - but after we left the Garden of Eden - the world was a busy place. People lived in homes that went up and up and up. Skyscrapers, they were called. And they had science and innovations. Women and men were equal, and people came in so many different colors."

"Fairytales," Meri scoffed.

"There's pictures," I insisted. "Men with skin as pale as ours, but dark black hair and eyes the color of thick tea. Women with skin the color of that tea and hair even darker. All colors."

"Drawings?" Callah asked.

I shook my head. "Actual photographs, like the ones we see of the surface in school."

"But no Dragons?" Meri asked.

"Dragons were things from fantasy," I explained. "I'm not quite sure what that means, but they were. Then again, there are also books of fantasy with drawings of dragons, so I don't know. Still, all the books with actual photographs don't mention them. No Dragons, no Devil, and no demons."

"Maybe the Devil brought the Dragons back?" Meri guessed.

"The Wyvern is his right hand," Callah quoted, doing her best to mimic our schoolteacher's masculine voice.

I chuckled at that. "What I don't understand is that a wyvern isn't a dragon. Dragons have four legs with wings. Wyverns have two legs with wings on their arms. How can the most terrifying Dragon be a wyvern too?"

"Maybe our hunters cut off two legs?" Meri guessed. "Gideon could've."

"Gideon got shot by the Wyvern," Callah reminded her.

"Callah!" I snapped, because the man's wounds had been treated, and it looked like he should live, but that wasn't guaranteed yet.

Callah just made a face. "Sorry, Meri."

"He could've on a good day," Meri said, changing her stance slightly. "Because Gideon is young and strong. He's going to be an excellent husband, and we'll have plenty of babies to refill the empty rooms, right? And he'll keep being strong enough that he will always make it back after hunting."

"He will," I told her, not really believing it. "He's going to be an amazing husband for you, Meri. You'll be so happy. Who knows, maybe you'll even fall in love with him?"

"And maybe he won't hurt me when we breed," Meri mumbled, her words growing softer. "Ayla, do you have any stories about good marriages where the wife makes her man happy?"

"Yeah," I said, lying back so I was looking up at the ceiling. "I read one of those the other day, but I think it's a fantasy."

"Tell it to me anyway?" she begged.

"Well, this was back when people still lived on the surface," I started. "The woman, let's call her Meri, like you? She walked into a place called a coffee shop. Behind the counter, waiting to make her a drink, was a man so beautiful it made her heart speed up."

"What's coffee?" Callah asked.

"A drink," I said, leaning to the side and stretching for the switch to control our room's light. When it was off, I said, "Now hush and listen. See, the man - Gideon - was trying to work hard so he could earn more privileges. Meri smiled at him, and he knew she was perfect for him. Her pale blonde hair and dark blue eyes were more than he could take. Immediately, he fell in love and swore to himself that he would talk to her again."

In the darkness, I could hear the soft, rhythmical breathing of my friends. All they'd needed was a little distraction from the excitement of the night and they'd passed out quickly. Smiling at that, I snuggled back into my bed and curled on my side. In the complete darkness of life underground, I couldn't see anything, but it didn't matter. I could hear them, my only two friends in the world.

"And Meri didn't have to marry him," I whispered. "Instead, she and her two friends ran away to a farm and raised plants to eat. With no men around, they could grow old together, laughing in the sunshine until the day they died."

"Yeah," Callah whispered, proving she wasn't quite asleep. "I like that story best."

"Me too," I agreed, "but Meri has to get married."

"So do we," Callah pointed out. "Sadly, so do we, Ayla."